Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 5.djvu/214

 192 THE BATTLE OF BALACLAVA. chap, ened, at the time, by any foreboding sentiments, __J men still remember how swiftly the messenger sped on his errand. That acclivity of some seven or eight hundred feet, which divided our Head- quarter Staff from the plain of Balaclava below, was of just such a degree of steepness that, whilst no rider of merely ordinary experience and boldness would like to go down it at a high rate of speed, and whilst few of those going slowly would refrain from somewhat easing the abruptness of the path by a more or less zig-zag descent, the ground still was not so precipitous as to defy the rapid purpose of a horseman who had accustomed himself, in such things, to ap- proach the extreme of what is possible. The special skill gained by such trials, with the bold- ness needed for using it, Nolan had in full measure ; and he was armed with cogent words for the man whom he had brought himself to condemn as the obstructor of cavalry enterprise. Straight, swift, and intent — descending, as it were, on sure prey — he swooped angering down into the plain where Lord Lucan and his squadrons were posted. IX. The position Although a period of some thirty, forty, or fifty Russian minutes had since elapsed, the position of the toe when Russian army was still nearly the same that it reached had been when Lord Lucan received his third Lord Lucan. , ., , n -. . order.* Jabrokntsky, with some 8 battalions,
 * The order directing liim to advance, and take advantage of